


Standing Watch in the Snow

by likethenight



Category: Agent Carter (TV), Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Christmas, Dementia, Gen, Memories, Memory Loss, Old Age, Older Characters, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-02
Updated: 2017-01-02
Packaged: 2018-09-14 07:30:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9168475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/likethenight/pseuds/likethenight
Summary: Peggy Carter can see that it's snowing, outside the window of her room in the nursing home. She's finding it harder and harder to keep a grip on her thoughts and memories, and she finds herself slipping back to a mission in the snow during the war...





	

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this for an Agent Carter Christmas fic fest, which I then forgot to sign up for in time...and then forgot to post the story before Christmas. *facepalm* Here it is for the New Year instead.

The window of Peggy Carter’s room in the nursing home looks out over the gardens. If Peggy angles the head of her bed just right, she can see the trees and flowerbeds, the perfectly-manicured grass. How wonderful to have a bed that moves at the touch of a button, she thinks to herself with only the tiniest flash of bitterness. At least she can still do this for herself. 

Peggy is lost in memories, much of the time. It frustrates her, when she is lucid enough to realise it, that she can’t hang onto her train of thought for any decent length of time in the present, and she keeps losing track of where and when she is. She tries to remind herself not to be bitter, but the loss of her mind, her most valued asset, still cuts her to the quick, when she is able to appreciate it.

Having to have help to do all the daily things she used to take for granted makes her snappy and cranky with the nursing home staff, much of the time. She tries not to be, but there’s something inside her, like a little demon, that brings the sharp words tumbling out of her before she can stop them, sharper and harsher than she ever was as the Director of SHIELD. 

She is not bedridden, not quite; she can get up, with help, and sit in a chair by the window, or she can walk very slowly down the hallway to the residents’ lounge. She chooses not to do that very often - she cannot bear to be surrounded by so many old people. But then when she looks in the mirror, she finds with a dull shock that she is an old person too. When did she get so ancient? Peggy can’t remember any more. 

It takes a great effort to hang onto the present day, and Peggy finds that most of the time she just doesn’t have the strength for it any more. Besides, the past is much more attractive. Why stay in the present when all she has to occupy herself is the view from her window or awful, stilted conversations with her few visitors, when she can slip away into the past, her memories of the life she has lived coming so much more vividly to her, so much more real than the life she finds herself living now?

Peggy does have visitors, and in that she is more fortunate than many of the other residents of the nursing home. Her children come to see her, sometimes, although they are occupied with their busy lives. Occasionally young Nicholas might drop by, looking different every time, although frankly Peggy can’t quite get used to him looking anything other than twenty-five years old and possessed of two fully-functioning and very sharp eyes. And sometimes Steve comes. Peggy often isn’t sure whether she’s dreaming Steve, because he looks just the same as he ever did before his plane went down, and it’s a shock to her all over again that he’s here, warm and smiling and alive after so very long. 

Christmas is drawing near, or at least, Peggy thinks it must be. The last of the leaves are still clinging onto the trees in the garden, the days are short - or at least, she thinks they are, but then sunset does seem to come around before she quite expects it to, these days. Then again, the staff come to put her to bed when it’s already dark, now, whereas in the summer the last of the light is still lingering in the corners of the garden when they pop in to ease her bed-head back and settle her against her pillows. The common areas of the nursing home are decked with tinsel and holly, garlands of pine branches and twinkling fairy lights, although Peggy has the distinct impression that they’ve been like that for some considerable time. She has a brief flash of memory of pumpkins and bats, the nurses in witches’ hats, and then all that swept away in a tide of glitter and brightly-coloured ribbons. 

Peggy often spends the afternoon in her chair, looking out over the garden to the distant peaks and spires of Washington DC until the sun sets and one of the nurses comes to give her her dinner and persuade her back into bed. They always call her Margaret, and Peggy never remembers that that's supposed to be her. She hasn't been called Margaret since she was a child, perhaps nine years old. Ever since then she's been Peggy, or Miss Carter, or Agent Carter or Director Carter. But the staff here seem determined to be as familiar and informal as they can be, and they've never once asked her what she would like to be called. Peggy isn't even sure whether she wants them to call her Director, or Miss Carter, or Peggy, but they've never asked, just assumed that the name on her file is the name they should call her.

It’s snowing this afternoon. Peggy is in bed, rather than in her chair, but the bed-head is raised and she is settled comfortably back against the pillows. It was sunny just a moment ago, she is sure it was, but then the clouds came up all iron-grey and heavy and the snow started to fall, just a little bit at first, a few flakes, but then more and more, heavier and heavier, coating the dormant flower-beds and the still-manicured lawns in a thick white blanket. The snowflakes spin down past her window in a dizzying dance and she blinks once, twice, the sterile walls of her room melting away and she is no longer in a bed in a nursing home in DC, her bones aching with all of her ninety-seven years; she is sitting in a hard wooden chair at a table in a cabin somewhere in the Alps, she is twenty-four years old and she is bloody _freezing_. She dare not light a fire for fear of alerting the enemy to her presence, because of course she is a lot further behind enemy lines than she should be. Her headphones are hard against her ears, giving her nothing but static from the field radio unit sitting in front of her on the table; she isn’t really expecting to hear anything just yet, Morita is probably too busy doing what the Howling Commandos have been sent out there to do to check in with their handler, but she is waiting for a message to tell her that their mission is accomplished and they are coming back to base.

Peggy hates this part, the sitting and waiting for them to return. Not because she is worried about them, far from it - because she wants to be out there with them, running and kicking and shooting their way towards the heart of HYDRA and the Nazi empire, rooting out the evil so that Europe can breathe freely again. Often that’s exactly what she gets to do, but there are missions that need a base, with someone to defend it who can work the radio, and this time she lost the coin-toss with Morita. So here she is, sitting at the table by the window, listening hard to the static in her ears and staring out of the cabin window, watching for any movement that shouldn’t be there. The falling snow is making it hard to distinguish anything, the afternoon sky almost as dark as night with the clouds that have drawn up to dump their contents all over this particular part of the mountainside. At least the cabin is built back into the mountain, so the approach from the front is all she has to worry about. Well, that and the roof, but there’s only so much a girl can watch, and the slope above her is steep enough that the front is the more likely candidate for an attack, if any wandering patrols of Nazis happen to work out that the cabin is not as unoccupied as it appears. 

Peggy blinks, her eyes are stinging and watering from staring out into the snowstorm. It’s almost as dark as night out there, though a glance at her watch tells her it’s only three in the afternoon. She shakes her head to dislodge a sudden feeling of deja-vu, her memory is playing tricks on her, didn’t she just compare the strange light out there to night-time, in her head? Concentrate, Carter. Keep listening. Keep watching. It’s nearly Christmas and her mind keeps wandering, tripping off back home, wondering what her parents are up to, what it’s like for the people of Great Britain, coming up to yet another wartime Christmas, making do and mending, making it as magical as they can manage. 

No Christmas for Agent Carter and the Howling Commandos, though. No time for such frivolous things as celebrations when there is such vital work to do, rooting out the evil at the heart of Europe. Even if they could get their hands on anything to celebrate with, they wouldn’t have time to do it. No allowance in their rations for extra, or for special things. Besides, it’s been days and days since they were back at base, they’ve been carrying their supplies with them in their backpacks. No chance of a jeep or a truck, this far into enemy country, they can’t have anything with them that might draw attention, no roaring American engines to give them away. Everything on foot, a long trek into the mountains through the snow and the wind until they found this little cabin, concealed in a clearing, crouched against the mountainside. Completely deserted and smelling quite distinctly of cattle, it must be a cowherd’s hut, for the summer months when the cows range across the high mountain grasslands, grazing happily with the soft clanking of the bells around their necks echoing across to the opposite side of the valley. They’re all down in the village now, sheltering from the winter weather in their owners’ barns, lowing softly to each other in the darkness. No danger of the summertime occupants of this little cabin returning now to discover Peggy and her Commandos, the pathways from the village are probably completely snowed under, impassable to all but the most foolhardy. Or those driven by ideology, of course. Peggy must remain vigilant.

Peggy’s stomach rumbles. Lunch was a strip of inedible dried beef, two hours ago; Peggy ate it anyway, no matter how inedible it was. Still more edible than some of the other items in their ration packs. No point in having anything now, though, because if she does there’ll be nothing to have at dinner time. She’s been trying to stick to set mealtimes as much as possible, trying to hang onto some semblance of normality. It doesn’t always work, of course; in fact, it works less often than not. She’ll be eating at three in the morning, or ten at night, depending on the demands of the mission. There is no semblance of normality here. She shakes her head again. The snowfall is making her confused, that and the unrelenting static in her ears. She can taste the dried beef on her tongue; or no, it’s not that, it’s something bitter, chemical, like medicine. The world shimmers before her eyes and she blinks, feeling as though she’s waking up, but then the static in her ears crackles to life and Morita’s voice snaps through the airwaves. 

“Mission accomplished. On our way home. Over.”

Peggy snatches up the microphone, immediately alert again. “Message received. What’s your ETA? Over.”

Morita laughs. “Your guess is as good as mine in this snow, Agent. Could be an hour, could be three. We’ll see you when we see you. Over.”

Peggy can’t help a smile. “Well, if that’s the best you can do. Over and out.”

“Over and out.” Morita closes the connection and the sea of static rises again, washing over Peggy, but she’s fully awake again now. 

She glances around the cabin, peering into the shadows, feeling oddly as though she should prepare it for the Commandos’ return, but of course there is nothing here to prepare, nothing other than their bedrolls and knapsacks, and anyway she is not their housekeeper. Besides, this isn’t exactly a house, it’s just a bare room set into the mountainside, smelling of cows. The cowherd has taken all his possessions back down into the valley with him, leaving only the table and chair. No matter, it serves their purpose. All they need is a sheltered base from which to operate.

She keeps her watch out of the window; the snowfall is slowing now, no longer the dizzying dance of snowflakes that almost put her to sleep. The clouds are parting and a shaft of sunlight suddenly pierces straight through the window, illuminating the radio and the bare wooden floor. Peggy blinks against the sudden brightness, magnified by the reflection of the sunlight off the blindingly white snow, and when her vision clears she realises that there is movement in the forest. Her hand is already at her side, resting on her holstered gun, when the movement dissolves into focus and she sees that it’s the Commandos stepping out into the clearing, immediately making a mess of the beautifully pristine snow with their great clodhopping boots, shattering the silence with their laughter. Peggy rolls her eyes, sometimes she wonders whether they even know the meaning of the word ‘stealthy’. But she’s smiling at the same time, a little tension melting out of her as she counts each one of them emerging from the trees; they are all there, and her heart gives a tiny warm jolt as she sees the smile on Steve’s face. 

They come crashing into the cabin, crowding in until the little room is completely full, yanking the door shut behind them. Dugan is crowing about something or other and she is about to read them the riot act about the noise when he dumps a whole ham on the table. Dernier pulls out a bottle of cognac, and Barnes leans over to drop two large bars of Swiss chocolate right in front of her. 

“Special delivery,” he says, and Peggy drops the headphones and shoves the heavy radio out of the way, pushing the chair back to get to her feet so that she can face them on their own level. 

“Gentlemen,” she says, “mission report, please. And quietly. I trust you have already reconnoitred the surrounding area.”

They come to order immediately, recognising the tone of her voice, and Steve takes the responsibility of delivering the report, as always.

“No enemy troops in the area,” he says, and Peggy gives them a long-suffering look. 

“I should hope not,” she says, “although if there are any of them within about five miles I should think we’ll find them knocking on the door soon enough, given the amount of noise you’ve been making.”

They bow their heads and shuffle their feet like naughty schoolboys, but it’s all an act, all part of the routine they go through every time, and Dugan is already chuckling. Peggy rolls her eyes and motions to Steve to continue his report.

“We were able to infiltrate the HYDRA facility under cover of the blizzard,” he says, “and we took them completely by surprise. We recovered the intelligence we needed, but we took no prisoners, as there were only a few men in occupation and they were all killed in the fighting. We planted enough explosive charges to completely destroy the facility.”

Peggy shrugs, she isn’t too bothered by the lack of prisoners, given that captive HYDRA agents have a nasty tendency to poison themselves rather than talk to the Americans. As long as the Commandos recovered the documentation they were after, then the mission can be declared a success - and doubly so if the facility is now disabled. Dernier’s grin tells her that the explosion was particularly spectacular, and she is rather sorry she didn’t get to see it.

“It looks to me as though the intelligence wasn’t all you recovered,” she says with half a smile, glancing at the table full of food. 

“We interrupted them eating their Christmas dinner,” Steve says, and Dugan gives a full-on belly laugh at that. 

“Not quite,” he says. “We interrupted them just as they were about to sit down to eat. We thought it’d be a shame to waste the food, so we liberated it.” Another laugh. “Serves them right for only posting one sentry.”

Peggy unbends completely at that. “Well, it certainly wouldn’t do to blow all of that to kingdom come. Terribly wasteful.”

“That’s what we thought,” says Jones, producing a bottle of wine and two packages of dates from inside his jacket. “It might not be quite Christmas yet, they were a couple days early celebrating, but going by the looks of the sky out there we’re probably going to be snowed in here for a little while, so we thought we may as well have a little extra for a celebration of our own.”

“Well done, soldiers,” says Peggy with a smile. “Morita, will you radio back to base, please? Give them the mission update, and tell them we’ll be back as soon as we can negotiate the pass.” She stands back to let him get to her radio, no sense in making him unpack his, and he sends the report while the others wriggle out of their coats and scarves, now soaking wet with melted snow. 

“I think we’re far enough away from civilization to light a fire,” Steve says once they’re all a little more comfortable, their coats spread out to dry. “We didn’t see a single settlement anywhere, and all the huts like this will be empty this time of year. Besides, I don’t think anyone is going to be able to get here to check us out, even if they do see the smoke. We were only just able to get back here as it is, and there’s more snow coming.”

Peggy weighs up the risks for a moment, then nods; Steve has seen more of their surroundings than she has, and he can see a lot further than she can. If he says there’s no sign of life in the area, then she believes him. In any case, if they were to be discovered they’re well-equipped to deal with any attackers. “Fine. Get the fire lit, then, one of you.” She smiles. “It looks as though it’s Christmas.”

They leap into action at her command, Jones and Morita arranging the food and drink properly on the table, Dernier and Falsworth getting the fire going with some of the kindling and split logs stacked beside the fireplace, Barnes and Dugan digging out their tin plates and mugs from the knapsacks. Steve and Peggy rig their scarves up along the walls to serve as garlands, and within a few minutes the little cabin looks as festive as any of the other places Peggy has spent Christmas since the war began. They share out the wine and toast to the festive season, and then Steve carves the ham with his utility knife and they all sit round on the floor to eat. 

Once they’ve finished the wine Falsworth pours the cognac, just a finger each at first, and they munch their way through the dates and chocolate as Dugan regales them with tales of his escapades as a circus strongman, and Falsworth amiably sends himself up with stories of what he got up to at boarding school and in officer training. Jones has a couple of shaggy-dog stories from his time in France, and a couple more from Dernier, although they lose a little something in translation. Morita has a good store of knock-knock jokes and Peggy’s sides ache from laughing and groaning at the terrible attempts at humour. Steve is quiet, watching the rest of them with pride, and Barnes is completely silent, though when Peggy glances at him he sends her a smile that tells her he is at least partly present in the room. He has a tendency to slip away into a trance-like reverie, and Peggy suspects he is more haunted by his time at Zola’s mercy than he would want to admit, but for now, at least, he seems to be holding on to the present. 

The tales get taller as the afternoon melts into evening and another finger or two of cognac find their way into the tin mugs. Peggy contributes a few stories herself, and she catches herself thinking that she had never expected to be this happy in the middle of such a terrible situation; somehow this wretched war has enabled her to become the person she had always aspired to be. Surrounded by her team of Commandos - surrounded by her friends - Peggy laughs and laughs, and she can’t think of anywhere she would rather be.

Later they settle down on their bed-rolls, tucked into their sleeping bags, and they all drift off to sleep, one by one, except Steve, who’s taken the first watch of course. Peggy watches them all in the warm light from the dying fire, and she feels completely content.

She blinks awake and for a moment she can’t remember where she is, but then the room swims into focus, the dim light from the bedside lamp, the curtains pulled across the window and the aches in her bones. She holds back a sob of pure frustration and disappointment, biting her lips together until the lump in her throat has subsided. Of course it was only a dream, or a memory. They have taken everything from her, she has known it for a long while, how could she have forgotten? If only she could remember who they were, she could have done something about it, but now she is just an old lady in a nursing home, dementia eating away at every part of her life. She should have caught them at it and she failed, and by the time she knew something was wrong it was too late. 

The bolt of anger clears her head, and she reaches for the button to make the bed-head tip upright so she can sit up. It moves so gradually, too slowly for her though she knows it’s so that she can’t hurt herself, and she hates that she needs that kind of caution here at the end of her life, hates it with every fibre of her being. As it brings her upright, she realises with a shock that there’s someone sitting in her chair, by the window, watching her with shadowed eyes. Peggy sucks in a sharp, shocked breath, her hand automatically reaching for a gun that isn’t there, hasn’t been there for years, but then the intruder moves a little so that the light from the bedside lamp catches his face, and she draws in another breath, she knows this man, and he cannot be here, it’s impossible. Even more impossible than Steve being alive. 

“Sergeant Barnes,” she says, and she is proud of how steady her voice is, even though it’s weakened by old age and lack of use.

“Agent Carter,” he says with a small smile. “It’s good to see you, ma’am.”

“What on earth are you doing here?” she demands. “You’re supposed to be dead.” No time for pussy-footing around here, she’s lucid right now but she doesn’t know how long she’ll be able to keep her grip on the present.

“I think I was dead,” he says. “For a long time. It’s a long story.”

“Give me the condensed version. I don’t have much time.”

He looks alarmed, and Peggy realises that she should have been a little clearer.

“My mind keeps deserting me. Bloody ridiculous. Tell me what happened while I can understand you.”

Barnes nods. “The Russians got me. And Zola. Turned me into their killing machine. I don’t remember much of it.” His face is set, his voice carefully emotionless. “Steve woke me up out of it. I was trying to kill him at the time.”

“Steve,” Peggy says, not quite able to hold back a smile. “I keep thinking I’ve dreamed him.”

Barnes coughs out something that might be a laugh but is too out of practice to be clear. “Me too. Not much makes sense, but he’s there. Makes it easier to kick the HYDRA stuff out of my brain.”

“HYDRA? I thought you said the Russians had you.”

“Russians, HYDRA, same difference. They were hand in glove. I don’t know the details. HYDRA had me most recently though.”

Peggy nods. “I thought they were up to something. They took me out, I’m sure of it now.” She isn’t sure where the words came from, her grip is already loosening again.

“I’ll find out,” Barnes promises her. “They were a lot of places that nobody realized. I’m rooting them out. Blowing them up.”

“You boys always were good at that,” Peggy says, and both of them smile. 

“I brought you some chocolate,” Barnes says suddenly, reaching into his jacket and holding out a couple of bars. “I remembered something, Christmas in the mountains or something, and there was chocolate, and you were there. I don’t have the before, or the after, but I remember all of us in some cabin, and you eating your share of chocolate like it was the best thing you’d ever tasted.”

“I was only just there,” Peggy says, feeling the confusion rise but she knows that much. “Just now, we were having Christmas and telling stories. You’d all gone off and blown up a HYDRA base and stolen their dinner.” She can’t hold back a chuckle, the memory is far clearer to her than the present day. “We all sat round on the floor and ate ham and dates and chocolate, and drank cognac and told silly stories. You were smiling, I remember that. It was a while since I’d seen you smile.”

Barnes smiles again, now, slowly. It makes him look more like the young soldier he used to be, although his hair is long now, down to his shoulders, and his eyes are hollow and haunted. Well, that hasn’t changed very much, Peggy thinks. Poor boy.

“That was a good moment,” he says. “Bright. Not a lot of that, after.” He breaks off a few pieces of the chocolate and pulls his chair closer so he can hand one to her. Peggy puts it in her mouth and lets it melt, savouring the taste. 

“Why are you here?” she hears herself ask him, though she isn’t sure why she needs to know. She isn’t really quite sure where ‘here’ is, either. It’s all getting a bit indistinct around the edges.

Barnes doesn’t answer for so long that she has almost forgotten she asked him the question when he finally does speak. “I don’t know. I remembered about the chocolate. And I knew you were here. I don’t know how. I don’t know how I know a lot of the things in my head.” He scrubs a hand through his hair. “But I knew you were here, and I remembered the chocolate, and I think it might be Christmas right now, and the next thing I knew, I was here. I snuck in, I thought the nurses wouldn’t want me disturbing you.”

“Nurses,” says Peggy. “No, nurses don’t like disturbances.” She used to tell people she’d been a nurse, before she’d become an agent, but it wasn’t true. Just a cover story for what she’d really been doing, which was breaking codes at Bletchley Park. “They’re quite strict. Very nice, but strict. They call me Margaret.” She closes her eyes, trying to hold onto why that’s ridiculous. “Nobody calls me Margaret. Unless I’m in trouble, then Mother might…” She trails off, because of course Mother is dead, and has been for nigh-on fifty years. 

Barnes gives her another piece of chocolate, and she lets it melt on her tongue like the last one. “I don’t really know what my name is, any more,” he says. “Well, I mean, I know what it is. But I don’t have anyone to call me anything. So I don’t know what they’d call me.”

“What about Steve?” Peggy asks, thinking something terrible must have happened if Barnes thinks he doesn’t have Steve. They were inseparable, all the time until Barnes went into that abyss, off that train. But he came back, he’s here now, so why doesn’t he have Steve?

“He called me Bucky,” Barnes says, his voice far away. “He knew who I was. Wasn’t till later that the pieces started falling into place. We’re not…I’m not…I don’t think I can see him, not yet. Not like this.”

“You know that Steve will forgive you anything,” Peggy says sternly, all the Howling Commandos need a firm hand to keep them in line. “He’d do anything for you. Don’t worry about him.”

“It’s not him I’m worried about, it’s me,” Barnes says. “I don’t know when - if - I’m going to turn back into the killing machine. HYDRA coded me. There’s things that’ll set me off. I haven’t gotten rid of all of them yet.”

“Steve will help you,” Peggy says. “That man never met a problem he didn’t want to fix. He usually managed it, too.”

“True enough,” Barnes says, with a rueful smile. “But I’m scared he might not be able to fix me. And I’m scared I might hurt him again. I’m not safe to be around.” He pauses, and his face contorts in sudden self-recrimination. “I shouldn’t be here, Peggy. You’re not safe.” He pushes the chair back, makes to stand up, but Peggy stretches out a hand to him. 

“Stop,” she says. “James Buchanan Barnes, I don’t believe you will harm me, regardless of what HYDRA did to you.” The name comes to her after only a moment’s thought, one of those names that is engraved on her mind, never to be forgotten even when there is nothing left of her.

Barnes does as he is told, lowering himself carefully back into the chair, but he doesn’t look convinced. “I’m not safe to be around,” he repeats. 

“Nonsense,” Peggy says briskly, or as briskly as she can manage. “You’ve been fine so far, haven’t you? I see no reason for that to change.” She gives him a determined smile. “If I can hang onto this moment, so can you. Now give me another piece of that excellent chocolate.”

Barnes obeys, and for a moment they sit in silence, both of them eating the chocolate and remembering.

“Is it still snowing?” Peggy asks after a little while. She can’t quite remember whether it was snowing before she went off into her reverie about the cabin in the mountains, or whether she’s remembering the snow falling as she waited for the Howling Commandos to complete their mission, but she thinks it’s worth asking.

Barnes gets up and goes to the window, tweaking the curtain aside to look out. “Looks like it’s started up again,” he says. “Want to see?”

“Yes please,” Peggy says, and Barnes pulls the curtains right back, anchoring them carefully with the tie-backs on each side of the window. The snow is falling heavily again, snowflakes swirling in the wind, and Peggy reaches out to turn off the bedside lamp so that she can see outside more easily. The lights of DC are just visible beyond the snowfall, but Peggy hardly sees them; for a moment she is back in that cabin again, taking her turn on watch, sitting in the darkness surrounded by the sleeping Commandos and watching the snow fall outside. Then Barnes comes to sit by her side and puts another piece of chocolate in her hand, and she comes back to the present again. 

“Steve will look out for you,” she says, and she hears Barnes’ low hum of - amusement?

“Maybe,” he says. “He always did, after all.”

“You looked out for each other,” Peggy reminds him. “Perhaps you should try doing that again.” She puts the chocolate in her mouth, lets it melt, savours the taste. The repetitive action is comforting, although she’s not sure what she needs comfort for. She’s quite happy, just for the moment, sitting here in the dark, eating chocolate and watching the snow with an old friend. 

“I sat watch with you for a while, that night in the cabin,” Barnes says suddenly. “Do you remember?”

And Peggy does. Sitting and staring out of the window, and realising that Barnes had joined her, completely silently. He had somehow gained the ability to move in utter silence, somewhere along the way, though whether it was Zola’s doing she never knew. A useful talent for a sniper to have, and Barnes was always one of the best. They sat together, not talking, sharing out their ration of the chocolate and watching the snow fall over the deserted landscape outside the window. They had never talked much, had never really got to know each other well, but that night, at least, they hadn’t had to. The silent companionship had been enough. 

“I remember,” she says, “as though it were yesterday.”

“We’ve come a long way since then, huh?” says Barnes, his voice warm with amusement, and Peggy isn’t really sure how long it’s been, any more, she can feel her grip on the present loosening, can feel it slipping through her fingers. 

“I suppose we have,” she says, “but here we are.” She isn’t quite sure where ‘here’ is, just for now, but it’s enough that Barnes is here. They’ve never been close, but he’s Steve’s oldest friend and so they have something in common, something important. Peggy is happy that he’s here with her to keep watch into the night, eating chocolate and watching the snow. She can’t remember any more why it’s remarkable that he’s here, but it doesn’t matter. For once she isn’t frustrated. Just for now, all is well.


End file.
